Domestic vehicle sales dropped by 98.4% from a year earlier to 574 units, the National Association of Automobile Manufacturers of South Africa said in an emailed statement Monday. That compares with average monthly trade of more than 41,000 units over that last 20 years.

South Africa implemented one of the most severe lockdowns in the world from March 27, allowing most citizens to only go out to buy food, seek medical care and collect welfare grants. For five weeks only essential goods were allowed to be sold and that meant car dealerships had to close their doors and could only start trading again from May 1, subject to specific directions. The Naamsa data show only 105 passenger cars were sold in April, a drop of 99.6%.

Some of those may, however, be transactions that started in March and were only finalized and recorded last month. The data form part of the Reserve Bank’s leading indicator, which gives a sense of the future state of the economy.

While the drop in sales was to be expected because dealerships were closed “it is a disaster,” said Mike Schussler, chief economist at Economists.co.za. “Consumer spending in South Africa at the moment will be a disaster.

I suspect we’re going to get very big-double digit annualized declines in the gross domestic product numbers on the back of very, very weak consumption expenditure.”